Potato and Turkey Tacos

Have you ever cooked something ordinary (a regular dish, an easy recipe, a family classic or comfort food) just to find out an explosion of flavors when you eat it? This happened to me over the weekend when I made a pretty ordinary dish for dinner after a long day of cleaning and running errands. I wanted something simple because it was late, we were hungry and a couple of movies were waiting for us to be watched.

In Mexico tacos de chorizo con papas (potato and chorizo tacos) are a kind of comfort food, more of a snack than a dinner, and you can find them in almost every corner. I have to improvise because I forgot to get chorizo (what kind of a Mexican cook am I?) so I used ground turkey. But ground turkey is plain and boring so I decided to spice it up a little bit. I don’t know if it was the mixture of all the spices, the guacamole or the fact that I hadn’t eaten them in years but these tacos were an explosion of flavor (or at least that’s what I thought) I didn’t take pictures of the process because I wasn’t even planning on bloggin about this dish. I never thought I was going to end up with such delicious comfort food.

•This dish is usually made with chorizo. If using chorizo you don’t need to add any spices.

Author: Ben

Recipe type: Lunch

Cuisine: Mexican

Serves: 10-12

Ingredients

•1 lb ground turkey

•½ tsp cumin

•½ tsp ground paprika

•½ tsp oregano

•½ tsp salt

•½ tsp ground black pepper

•½ tsp chili powder

•½ tsp crushed red peppers

•2 TSP vegetable oil

•1 onion, sliced

•2 large potatoes, diced

•10 small corn tortillas (I used flour tortillas)

**For the Guacamole:

•1 avocado

•¼ onion

•1 TSP chopped cilantro

•juice of 1 small lime

•1 small jalapeno pepper, veined and seeded

•1 cup canned tomatoes

Instructions

In a medium skillet fry ground turkey with all the spices until it starts turning brown

In a large skillet sauté sliced onion and add potatoes when onion is translucent.

Add turkey to the potatoes and cover. Cook until potatoes are tender. Adjust seasoning, if needed.

In the meantime using a food processor, mix the rest of the ingredients, avocado, onion, cilantro, lime juice, jalapeno and tomatoes. That’s all you need to make delicious guacamole.

Warm up tortillas. The best way to warm up tortillas is on a comal or on a heavy skillet. Warming tortillas in the microwave will make them mushy.

Serve hot with guacamole and enjoy.

3.1.09

Like I mentioned before, it is a really easy and not out of the ordinary dish, but the spices and the guacamole made it really tasty or maybe I am just homesick and tasted delicious just to me, but maybe you will also enjoyed it as much as I did.

Buen provecho!

Update 03-04-08:2008 has been declared the International Year of the Potato (IYP) by United Nations to raise awareness of the importance of the potatoe. Sia over at Passionate about Life ‘n Spice is hosting a food event called Ode to Potato as part of this important movement. Timing could not have been better for this post so I am participating in the event with this recipe that has drawn so many positive comments. Don’t forget to visit Sia’s blog and participate in the event.

20 comments

This happens to me on a regular basis and sometimes when we have people over, it’s surprising that the simpler and easier food I prepared was a the bigger hit instead of the ones I laboured over for hours or days. Haha.

I can imagine how good the cumin and paprika was for the meat! When I looked at your tacos, it almost reminds me of picadillo…in a taco.

You would not believe how many of the recipes posted on CbsoP are from dinners I had absolutely no plan of blogging about. You may never know what the exact reason for the wonderful flavors were, but simpler is almost always better. (Says the man who will happily use every herb in his spice cabinet in one dish, usually with great success.)
BTW, I rarely cook Mexican food, but even I have chorizo in my fridge… Shame On You! 😉 Just kidding.. I regularly forget to buy milk, and I have a 1 1/2 year old in the house!)

Oh, Ben … now you’ve done it. I used to live in Austin TX and there was this little place in the middle of nowhere that sold the BEST ‘breakfast tacos’ (everyone should visit Porfirio’s). The tacos were made from fresh flour tortillas filled with a variety of mixtures, my favorite was potato, egg, and cheese. It was my first experience having a potato in the same proximity as a tortilla.

Your potato tacos reminded me of them. Seriously, I think they were the single best food I’ve ever eaten and I can see why they are considered a comfort food. I’ve tried to find something similar here in California, but haven’t found anything like them. I assumed it must be a Tex-Mex thing, but now I know potato tacos are alive and well in Ohio!

I’ll have to give your recipe a try — they look SO good. I want one right now. 🙂

double yum. i love tacos. in our house, we abide by the “taco rule”: when tacos are made, there can be no leftovers; one must consume filling available. i would have no problem doing that with these tacos, anything with cumin and paprika is alright by me!

I love these – I make them with egg and potatoes instead of the chorizo, although I’ve made them both ways. Yum! And your recipe looks wonderful. And I had one of those experiences with a chili I made last week. It’s great when that happens.

Mmmm- don’t tell anyone but one of my favorite comfort foods is mashed potato enchiladas. People always turn their noses up when I mention them. But growing up- it really was grab whatever is leftover in the fridge or have on hand in the pantry and stick it in a tortilla.
You should try ground turkey sausage. It’s a staple in my house. We always have some in the freezer and it makes a nice alternative to beef and pork (which I don’t eat anymore). Damn I miss chorizo.